The best fights are the ones we avoid.
Martial arts is for defense. It's not for attacking. So when people are fighting, always, always, defend.
I hope next time when we meet, we won't be fighting each other. Instead we will be drinking tea together.
Even during the promotion I told people that I didn't like Rush Hour. The jokes I didn't understand and the fighting, compared to my Hong Kong films was terrible. A lot of people didn't like it. But mostly people did like it, they really liked it. Rush Hour really brought me to the American family audience.
We learn martial arts as helping weakness. You never fight for people to get hurt. You're always helping people.
First, there are many who can fight, but they're small in stature; Zhang Lanxin is 177 cm [5'9"+] tall, with very long hands and legs, and very quick. In the scenes, I tried to show all of her special strengths and qualities. Plus, Zhang Lanxin has extraordinary staying power: it was only yesterday at the airport that I saw her cell phone photos from the hospital where she was having blood clots in her knee being cleared up, and I hadn't known till then that she had this problem.
It is totally different making films in the East than in the West. In the East, I make my own Jackie Chan films, and it's like my family. Sometimes I pick up the camera because I choreograph all the fighting scenes, even when I'm not fighting. I don't have my own chair. I just sit on the set with everybody.
I sometimes just don't like to see the Ultimate Fighting. I just find it, as a martial artist, I just find it too violent.
I thought I should forget Hollywood and go back to Hong Kong. I'm so lucky that finally Hollywood accepts my comedy fighting.
American movies show you how to fight and break armsand necks. I want to make the action in my movies like dancing.
I'm tired of fighting. I've always known that I can't be an action star all my life.
I now have two different audiences. There's the one that has been watching my action films for 20 years, and the American family audience. American jokes, less fighting.
